What exactly do they mean when they say, “own it”?

We all know that dreaded feeling. The ugh in the pit of your stomach when someone asks, “So, what do you do?” at a party, meetup, or networking lunch.

It is NOT our favorite question.

(Although we’ve been guilty of asking a similarly annoying one like “What’s your dream?” to thousands of people around the world. And yes, we get the irony.)

At the beginning, when we were still on our RTW bike journey, it was the incredulity and/or sarcasm that followed that really got to us.

“You’re what…??! That’s too incredible! Tell us the truth now c’mon!”

“Well good for you, your parents must be rich then…”

“Your legs must be super strong huh. No wonder you’re in such good shape!”

Seriously?

No people. Nooooo. Nope. No.

Here’s what truly incredible:

The 14 year old girl from a remote village in Guatemala who trekked for 4 hours in the morning since 4 am, crossing the lake, and a few mountains along the way, so that she could get to school and become the first female in her entire family ancestry to get an education.

She was so thrilled to have met us when we went to her school to give a Spanglish presentation. She told us, “I knew that girls can study, too!”

Here’s someone who’s truly rich:

A 30-something year old man who is a high-performing lawyer in one of the top law firms in Mexico City by day, and then walks the streets of the same city, perfecting his fire juggling act in the middle of crossings at night.

His dream was to gather all the street jugglers around the world and perform together at a convention in el Zocalo of the city – so that they could connect, exchange pointers, and share skills of the trade – like real craftsmen would.

A year after we met, he realized his dream, and went full time into fire-juggling as a vocation.

Here’s how true strength and good shape looks like:

The successful business owner who, at the height of her first pregnancy, decided to quit her 6-figure career and start her own business, so that she can inspire her kids to live the lives they want.

8 years, 2 kids, and 1 reputation of the woman who has it all later, she’s taking the plunge to explore “What’s Next?” in life. “I want to keep growing.”

Of course, we didn’t reply the nice folks we’d just met with these retorts.

We simply smiled meekly and immediately tried to blend into the walls behind us.

It took us about 100+ of these meetings across 6 cities before people started replying us with…

“Oh wow! That sounds amazing. Tell me more!”

“How did you girls fund your trip? And how can we help you go further?”

“You girls look so happy with what you’re doing. Kudos on taking that courageous leap of faith! What are some of the most inspiring dreams you’ve collected so far?”

What changed?

We were still introducing ourselves as “Tay and Val, on a journey to cycle around the world to collect people’s dreams.”

We were still in new social settings.

We were still meeting these people for the first time.

What changed?

We started owning it.

“It” = all of us.

Who we are, what we’re doing, where we’re headed towards, how we’re getting there, and why so.

But first, we had to stop.

We stopped belittling ourselves and the impact we were set on making on the journey. We stopped looking at what we were doing through the lens of incredulity. We started believing… in ourselves.

We stopped feeling guilty about leaving our “good” careers; and consequently, the good lives we were supposed to be providing for our parents, our families behind. We stopped hiding in the shame of being unfilial by society’s standards. We started making peace with ourselves… and later with our families.

We stopped making ourselves suffer by intentionally eating frugally (vs nourishing with what our bodies truly needed), and unintentionally manifest roadblocks and detours (quite literally, too!) on our bike routes. We stopped giving away our power to others and making them (the corporate sponsors, the couchsurfing hosts, the good weather, the good luck, the almighty Universe etc.) responsible for our successes and failures. And we started…

Owning. It.

Every bit of it.

“When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.” — Esther Hicks

Because we believed in ourselves, we began meeting people who believed in us.

Because we made peace within ourselves and our families, we began connecting with kindred souls we now call our global #soulfamily.